Walking sticks are a dime and dozen, but not ones with an in-built compass. Or ones with a whistle attached. Or ones hewn in the shape of animals, birds or monsters.
A bunch of friends brought over a collection of such sticks from Bengaluru last weekend, to the Covelong Point Surf, Music and Yoga Festival. Needless to say, they drew a huge crowd. “We sold around 22 sticks in two days,” says Bheemaiah KK, who finds and runs the outfit — Bheemstyx — in his name.
“Bheemstyx means strong styx,” laughs the 33-year-old. Bheemaiah says he begun designing walking sticks three years ago, while trekking around his coffee and cardamom plantations in Coorg.
“A friend handed me a rattan vine stick, and said it would help me trek,” he recalls. He soon formed a habit of picking up sturdy sticks on walks, treks and hikes, and seeing if they could be carved and then used.
All around you
“All the sticks we use are ones we pick up from the ground. We don’t chop down anything,” stresses Bheemaiah, adding, “I’ve picked them up from hills, parks, public and private properties.” Soon enough, his friends also started following suit.
“I would just clean the sticks, expose them to smoke to make them dry out, smoothen and carve. It was my friends who first started painting them and getting creative,” says Bheemaiah. The entire process can take either a month or over a year, depending on how fresh the stick is, the design envisioned and other factors.
The final products are as varied as they are exquisite... classic walking sticks with curved handles, hikers’ sticks with compasses and whistles, decorative sticks with the heads hewn in shapes of elephants or spirits, deep river walking sticks that can withstand the water, broom sticks, garden sticks...the list goes on.
Group effort
Now, Bheemstyx are made by a group of around forty friends, neighbours, students and “anyone who wants to lend a hand,” says Bheem. “We even give some college students monthly perks if they want to sit and paint,” he adds. The team has painters of literally all ages.
For something run — and even owned — entirely by part-timers, Bheemstyx seems to be doing pretty well. “Our sticks sell for anything between ₹500 and ₹12,000. The highest price I have charged till date is ₹15,000 for one stick,” says Bheemaiah. The three days at the Covelong Fest alone got them business worth ₹52,000, he adds.
Despite all the painting and polishing, the end creations manage to retain a natural feel — you would find it quite easy to pick up, say, a cream coloured stick that has the head of a sky blue elephant, for instance, and still imagine it having fallen amid mud and grass on some hilly track, waiting to be picked up and given a fresh lease of life.